Experimental Mudstone Sedimentology: An Attempt at Reverse Engineering of Natural Processes

尤尔根实验泥岩沉积学：自然过程逆向工程的尝试(EAR-0308921)尤尔根·谢伯和约翰·南印第安纳大学和MITABSTRACTRACTS泥岩是细粒沉积物，在整个地球历史上非常丰富。它们的矿物记录了古代风化的状态、过去的气候和海洋化学的变化。由于其细粒度的性质，它们也非常有效地密封和保存有机成分，如植物和动物化石。因此，泥岩包含了我们可以获得的有关有记录的地球历史的最大份额的信息。然而，尽管有这样的重要性，我们对过去泥岩沉积过程的理解是初步的。因此，了解这些过程并在岩石记录中识别它们必须是我们试图从岩石记录中读出过去条件的一个重要方面，例如气候、大气和海洋化学，以及生物重要化学元素(如碳、硫、磷)回收的有效性。PIS将通过一系列水槽实验开始填补我们在理解上的这一空白，在这些实验中，PIS将使泥浆基质在实验室流道中受到一系列影响。通过拟议的水槽设施，PIS计划定量探索影响泥岩沉积的因素，以及由各种参数组合产生的小规模沉积特征。这些参数包括盐度、粘土类型、流速、泥浆的含水率、连续和间断的泥沙补给量以及波浪作用。这项研究收集的数据将为解释泥岩沉积的物理方面提供基线，并将使他们能够确定未来研究的优先领域。

EAR-0308921 Schieber, JuergenExperimental Mudstone Sedimentology: An Attempt at Reverse Engineering of Natural Processes (EAR-0308921)Juergen Schieber and John SouthardIndiana University and MITABSTRACTMudstones are fine-grained sediments that are very abundant throughout earth history. Their minerals record the state of ancient weathering, past climates, and changes in ocean chemistry. Because of their fine-grained nature they also are very effective to seal in and preserve organic components, such as plant and animal fossils. As such, mudstones contain the lion's share of information available to us on recorded earth history. Despite of that significance, however, our understanding of the processes that deposited the mudstones of the past is rudimentary. Thus, understanding these processes and identifying them in the rock record has to be an essential aspect of our attempts to read out of the rock record the conditions of the past, such as climate, atmosphere and ocean chemistry, and effectiveness of recycling of biologically important chemical elements (e.g. carbon, sulfur, phosphorous). PIs will begin to fill this gap in our understanding through a series of flume experiments where they subject mud substrates to a range of influences in a laboratory flow channel. With the proposed flume facility PIs plan to quantitatively explore the factors that influence mudstone deposition, and the small-scale sedimentary features that result from combinations of a variety of parameters. These parameters include for example salinity, clay type, flow velocity, water content of mud, continuous vs. episodic sediment supply, and wave action. The data collected in this study will provide a baseline for interpreting the physical aspects of mudstone deposition, and will also allow them to identify priority areas for future research.